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"Washington will spend $2.6 million training Chinese prostitutes to drink more responsibly on the job"

With this web application you can clearly see that Government Revenues are down over the last 2 years. However, what is really heartbreaking is that in 2007, just 3 years ago, revenue was 2.6 T and the deficit was just 160 B. For 2010 the revenue is down .4 T to a still healthy 2.2 T but the deficit is up 10X to 1.6 T!!!!!

4. Government auditors spent the past five years examining all federal programs and found that 22 percent of them — costing taxpayers a total of $123 billion annually — fail to show any positive impact on the populations they serve.[4]

5. The Congressional Budget Office published a “Budget Options” series identifying more than $100 billion in potential spending cuts.[5]

7. Washington will spend $2.6 million training Chinese prostitutes to drink more responsibly on the job.[7]

8. A GAO audit classified nearly half of all purchases on government credit cards as improper, fraudulent, or embezzled. Examples of taxpayer-funded purchases include gambling, mortgage payments, liquor, lingerie, iPods, Xboxes, jewelry, Internet dating services, and Hawaiian vacations. In one extraordinary example, the Postal Service spent $13,500 on one dinner at a Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse, including “over 200 appetizers and over $3,000 of alcohol, including more than 40 bottles of wine costing more than $50 each and brand-name liquor such as Courvoisier, Belvedere and Johnny Walker Gold.” The 81 guests consumed an average of $167 worth of food and drink apiece.[8]

14. A GAO audit found that 95 Pentagon weapons systems suffered from a combined $295 billion in cost overruns.[14]

15. The refusal of many federal employees to fly coach costs taxpayers $146 million annually in flight upgrades.[15]

16. Washington will spend $126 million in 2009 to enhance the Kennedy family legacy in Massachusetts. Additionally, Senator John Kerry (D-MA) diverted $20 million from the 2010 defense budget to subsidize a new Edward M. Kennedy Institute.[16]

18. Despite trillion-dollar deficits, last year’s 10,160 earmarks included $200,000 for a tattoo removal program in Mission Hills, California; $190,000 for the Buffalo Bill Historical Center in Cody, Wyoming; and $75,000 for the Totally Teen Zone in Albany, Georgia.[18]

24. Auditors discovered that 900,000 of the 2.5 million recipients of emergency Katrina assistance provided false names, addresses, or Social Security numbers or submitted multiple applications.[24]

25. Congress recently gave Alaska Airlines $500,000 to paint a Chinook salmon on a Boeing 737.[25]

26. The Transportation Department will subsidize up to $2,000 per flight for direct flights between Washington, D.C., and the small hometown of Congressman Hal Rogers (R-KY) — but only on Monday mornings and Friday evenings, when lawmakers, staff, and lobbyists usually fly. Rogers is a member of the Appropriations Committee, which writes the Transportation Department’s budget.[26]

27. Washington has spent $3 billion re-sanding beaches — even as this new sand washes back into the ocean.[27]

28. A Department of Agriculture report concedes that much of the $2.5 billion in “stimulus” funding for broadband Internet will be wasted.[28]

29. The Defense Department wasted $100 million on unused flight tickets and never bothered to collect refunds even though the tickets were refundable.[29]

30. Washington spends $60,000 per hour shooting Air Force One photo-ops in front of national landmarks.[30]

31. Over one recent 18-month period, Air Force and Navy personnel used government-funded credit cards to charge at least $102,400 on admission to entertainment events, $48,250 on gambling, $69,300 on cruises, and $73,950 on exotic dance clubs and prostitutes.[31]

32. Members of Congress are set to pay themselves $90 million to increase their franked mailings for the 2010 election year.[32]

33. Congress has ignored efficiency recommendations from the Department of Health and Human Services that would save $9 billion annually.[33]

34. Taxpayers are funding paintings of high-ranking government officials at a cost of up to $50,000 apiece.[34]

35. The state of Washington sent $1 food stamp checks to 250,000 households in order to raise state caseload figures and trigger $43 million in additional federal funds.[35]

36. Suburban families are receiving large farm subsidies for the grass in their backyards — subsidies that many of these families never requested and do not want. [36]

37. Congress appropriated $20 million for “commemoration of success” celebrations related to Iraq and Afghanistan.[37]

40. North Ridgeville, Ohio, received $800,000 in “stimulus” funds for a project that its mayor described as “a long way from the top priority.”[40]

41. The National Institutes of Health spends $1.3 million per month to rent a lab that it cannot use.[41]

42. Congress recently spent $2.4 billion on 10 new jets that the Pentagon insists it does not need and will not use.[42]

43. Lawmakers diverted $13 million from Hurricane Katrina relief spending to build a museum celebrating the Army Corps of Engineers — the agency partially responsible for the failed levees that flooded New Orleans.[43]

Because many of these examples of waste overlap, it is not possible to determine their exact total cost. Yet it is evident that Washington loses hundreds of billions of dollars annually on spending that most Americans would certainly consider wasteful. Lawmakers seeking to rein in spending and budget deficits should begin by eliminating this least justifiable spending while also addressing long-term entitlement costs.